Wings of fire: The forgotten egg
by Dravi
Summary: In the prologue of Escaping Peril, there is one line about a Skywing hatchling that escaped Scarlet. This is the story of the lost Skywing.
1. Prologue

Prologue

Cinnabar leapt from the mountain and spread his wings, catching the air. Although flight usually calmed him, it took little thought to realize his source of distress. It had a name, and it was Peril. The queen's favorite new toy was an abomination. _It's not all bad,_ he thought. _The arena's gonna get a lot more interesting._ A small part of him protested that he didn't even like the arena, but he threw that thought out quick. Thoughts like that could get him killed. He had work to do. He needed to find the Skywing dragonet.

"We'll find it, your majesty," He had said. "I promise, she won't get far. It was a runty one anyhow."

And yet, as he brushed the foliage with his garnet wingtips, he doubted. And as he glanced red scales with his sharp SkyWing eyes, he doubted.

Not that he wouldn't find it, of course. Between his sharp eyes and the three full moons, he knew he'd find it.

He doubted he could kill it.

The little thing with a twisted wing at the bottom of a gorge looked so… defeated, as Cinnabar's talons thumped to the ground beside it. The dragonet whimpered, and went limp. Was it accepting its fate?

It wasn't that he hadn't killed before. As one of the most capable guards, his claws had snapped countless SeaWing and IceWing necks.

But he couldn't bring himself to kill this.

Before this very moment, he had considered himself undyingly loyal to his queen. But this dragon had done nothing wrong by existing, had it? And he didn't want this war to go on, he honestly didn't care who won, he just wanted it to be _over._ And he didn't quite believe in the prophecy. But he wanted to. He realized wanted that hope.

 _Have I really gone soft?_ He thought, Reaching out with his talons.

If he killed it, he'd earn survival for another day. If she brought the dragonet to the queen, Peril would kill it, so killing it himself would do the dragonet a mercy. He roughly scooped up the dragonet, a quiet growl rising, and relocated it's wing with a click. He would say he covered this area, which he did. He would make sure no one saw it until it was well out of SkyWing territory.

"Live, little dragon." He gingerly placed it on the forest floor and gave it a push. Dragonets were never Cinnabar's thing. "This war has already taken enough lives."


	2. Chapter 1

Chap 1

Sparrow's sib unit was undoubtedly strange.

It was small, with only four members, but especially now with the war, small units weren't unheard of. But generally at around two or three, groups decided to band with someone else.

But that wasn't what got looks from seemingly every other dragon in Pyrrhia. It was Sparrow's red scales and massive wings that made her different and strange and untrustworthy in the eyes of the MudWing tribe. She couldn't imagine why, as he MudWings and SkyWings were allied in the war. Sparrow observed another such example, as a lone MudWing that wasn't very good at concealing it's stare flew overhead. Sparrow stuck out her tongue and adjusted her position. Most of the time that was a bad idea, but Sparrow figured that dragon had better things to do. It looked away and kept flying. _He better_ , she though.

Her eyes wandered to Sinkhole, who was asleep in the mudbank next to the stream. His hand was curled protectively around his leather pouch. When Sinkhole had first told everyone about his rock-collecting hobby, Sparrow had laughed it off. They were just rocks, and a rocks only use was to make them into mediocre spears. Sparrow thought the rocks were interesting now though, and one had to appreciate that he had spent hours looking for each and every one of them. He had five total, each representing one of Sparrow's sibs. Sort of.

Lotus, the bigwings' rock was a smooth, pale, tear-drop shaped river stone. It was rippled with obsidian throughout. The rock was unblemished by nature, perfectly silky and surprisingly sharp despite being in a world of dragons.

Frog's rock was smaller, but it made up for it in beauty. It was flat, round and brown, with a brilliant rivulet of clear, green, stone cutting through the middle. Frog could throw it and it would skip, skip, skip over the water before sinking.

Sinkhole's rock seems boring at first sight. His rock was a monotonous brown, and the largest of them all. At a glance, it would seem like it was a dried lump of forgotten mud, but should it be flipped over, from a bowl like cavity, a dazzling display of deep blue crystals grew in layers. A geode, Sinkhole had specified.

And Sparrow's rock? It was a sharp red piece of sandstone, from near the SkyWing mountains. And embedded in it the fragile skeleton of a bird. A fossil. Lotus found it creepy, but Sparrow thought it was the coolest thing ever.

The fifth rock was a tiny, plain stone with a jagged crack though the middle. Now Sparrow had only been told about this, but apparently there were four eggs in the clutch. When Lotus had cracked the last egg, she only found a body. A dragon that could have been. Sparrow didn't know why Sinkhole gave that one a rock. _I should really stop thinking about this._

She gently stirred her tail in the stream, letting the current's tug of liquid cold climb up her tail and under her scales, chilling her. She tucked her tail under her front talons, trying to find the sun's warmth again. Suddenly, a dragon exploded out of the river, a brown-green blur with an unusually short tail.

"How long?" Frog wheezed, dragging himself onto the riverbank.

Sinkhole, on a nearby rock, didn't even open his eyes. "One hour, two minutes, and forty-five seconds, Frog. New record?" Sparrow had assumed that Sinkhole was asleep.

"Hah! Just as I thought."Frog pumped his claw in the air "That's twelve seconds longer than my high score AND proves my theory that we're all part SeaWing."

Sparrow snorted "I bet I have more SeaWing in me than all of you amphibians combined." That was a joke, of course. Sparrow could swim just fine, but she hated the way the water pressed in everywhere and slithered between her scales. It made her feel colder than anywhere else. But sadly, it was necessary living in a MudWing sib unit. She had to swim. She didn't enjoy it, not like flying. There was freedom in flying, no water and currents dragging you down. In the air it's just you and your wings.

Sinkhole's ear turned towards the woods. "Lotus is back." A few seconds later, Lotus emerged from the forest, with the graceful confidence she always wore.

"Bigwings!" Frog flapped into the air, then flung himself into a hug.

Lotus smiled and gently put him down. "Relax, Frog. I've only been gone for two hours."

"How did the bigwings meeting go?" Sparrow asked, peering over the edge of the boulder.

"More exciting than usual. Scarlet will be arriving tomorrow." Sparrow responded.

Sinkhole frowned at that. "Didn't the queens meet for planning yesterday?"

Lotus shrugged. "I don't get it either. Apparently Moorhen didn't know why either, but she said it seems important to Burn and Scarlet both. Everyone's required to come."

Sparrow flinched "Everyone?" Sparrow didn't usually come to those...too many stares. And what if the SkyWings took her back?

"MudWings and SkyWings, Sparrow. Nothing to worry about." Lotus said, twisting her tail around itself. She always did that when she was worried. "We don't need to concerned about that yet." Sinkhole reasoned. He had noticed Lotus' distress as well. "It's not like there's any reason Scarlet would separate us."


	3. Chapter 2

Chap 2

The unit flew back inland. A few hours later, they reached the capital, just as the sun glanced the horizon. Unlike the low-class delta area, the main area had intimidating sleep houses. Each great pillars of masoned stone, with gaps for doors protected by large, waterproof leaves "borrowed" from the nearby rainforest. Sparrow quietly followed Lotus into one of the leaf-doors. They found an unoccupied sleep spot, and then fell into a lump of limbs and wings and tails. The unit below was quite loud, with hushed, argumentative yell-whispers that Sparrow didn't care to listen to. Eventually though, mind filled with lurking thoughts of tomorrow, she fell asleep.

As colour once again creeped across the sky, they set out for the castle.

Honestly, Sparrow couldn't decide whether it was a castle or a fortress. The walls were thick and brown like mudwing scales, and it wasn't very impressive in height, but it was wide and sprawling, so it wouldn't sink into the swamp itself. Sparrow could see units fly between different outposts, with units averaging around tens and twelves, nothing like her group's measly four. They were armored and bore weapons. But no eyes came for Sparrow, so perhaps everyone was more used to skywings around the capital.

"Formation Alpha!" Lotus barked, startling Sparrow.

She quickly twisted out of the v-formation that they used for long distance flying and flew higher, covering the unit from above. With the same practiced efficiency, Sinkhole and Frog moved forward, a little in front of Lotus. They used this for attacking lone opponents, especially ones that were bigger or scarier than them.

Sparrow looked around for a dragon to engage, before realizing that there weren't any. She dropped her claws.

"Lotus? You seeing something I'm not?"

Lotus shook her head. "Just wanted to see if you were on your toes. You all fumbled expect for Frog."

"Of course we fumbled! There's a million guards and we're too far inland to need to be worried about attacks anyway!" Sparrow flapped her wings, gaining a little more speed then perhaps necessary, while Lotus merely laughed.

"That's exactly why I need you to focus. Because you're not. And do be so confident in your odds, Sparrow. Allegedly, there are two queens...and a third in that castle. A successful attack would eliminate Burn from the war."

"Guys," Sinkhole's voice, but Sparrow wasn't listening.

"50% of the reason you did that was because you were bored, Lotus. You made those reason up on the spot." Breaking position, Sparrow whirled above Lotus, and jabbed at her back with her tail.

"Sparrow, can you not?" Lotus hissed, batting at Sparrow with her wings.

"SIBS! Stop acting like 2 year olds and look!" Sinkhole could be very loud when he needed to be. They looked to see Frog shaking, his wings unsteady and his eyes scrunched, Sinkhole already at his side. Swan swooped over with skywing-like speed, then we banked to the watery bog. I watched helplessly as everyone crowded around him.

"Frog, it's alright, we're alright, there's nobody here. It's fine." Swan comforted, but Frog was shaking, looking down at the end of his tail. Sparrow watched, a few paces and a whole world away from her sibs.

Sparrow remembered it vividly, horribly. Scorching heat and jagged cold, In sickening waves of smells and sights of red and blue and brown and blood. Sparrow remembered fighting with her tiny sib unit, her above and everything she cared about below, her repelling bolts of ice breath with her own bright fire, making sure none reached her sibs. Until it didn't. Until she got overzealous, and aimed at a lone target instead of focusing on what mattered. And then a cry of pain. And then looking back to see frost spiderwebbing up Frog's tail. And then panic in the form of a blast of fire to remove it, remove her mistake. But not fast enough

Frog's tail is only half as long as a normal, and Sparrow knows exactly who's fault it is.

Lotus's voice was hoarse. "It's time to go to the meeting, Frog. can you do that?" Frog nodded.

They rose from the water again, and flew silently towards the assembly.


End file.
